2008

March 2008

(Above) Letter dated 25 March 1938 from Eduard Hempel, German Minister to Ireland, to Taoiseach Eamon de Valera regarding a demonstration held in O’Connell Street on 18 March to protest against the recent Nazi annexation or Anschluss of Austria. Hempel objects not only to the burning of the swastika at the end of the protest meeting and the fact that the police did nothing to prevent this, he also rejects newspaper reports that he had misused his diplomatic privileges and complains that the protest was permitted in the first place. He requests that the matter be fully investigated, the perpetrators punished and steps taken to prevent against the repetition of such an incident.